This invention relates to the handling of particulate material, and more specifically relates to method and apparatus for removing a settled body of particulate material of the type that forms a pumpable slurry with a liquid.
Heretofore bulk particulate material such as dressed mineral ores, mineral salts and other finely divided material has been transported for storage or processing by procedures which involve forming a slurry of the material with a liquid. As an example, dressed mineral ores at a mining operation have been formed into a slurry with water, pumped through pipelines into the hold of a ship or other vessel, settled in the hold by decanting supernatant water fractions, transported to destination, unloaded by reslurrying the settled material with water jets mounted within the hold, and then pumping the reslurried material from the vessel to a shore installation. Procedures of the foregoing nature are costly in view of the highly specialized equipment that is required in the vessel for the reslurrying operation. It is necessary to either initially design and build the vessel with the required reslurrying equipment, or extensively modify existing vessels. The result is that the cost of a reslurrying vessel of the type described requires a considerable capital outlay which is not justified except with relatively frequent slurry cargo discharging because the on-board reslurrying equipment in such a vessel is used only during slurry unloading operations.